


A Good Sketch Is Better Than A Long Speech

by izumi2



Series: Irrefutable Evidences [1]
Category: The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: BAMF Pepper Potts, BAMF Tony Stark, Begins at her BIRTH, F/M, Female Tony Stark, Not A Fix-It, Not Steve Friendly, Protective Thor, Thor Is Not Stupid, Tony Stark Has A Heart, at all!, but fast forward, you were warned!
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-17
Updated: 2016-12-19
Packaged: 2018-09-09 04:46:33
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 8,694
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8876569
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/izumi2/pseuds/izumi2
Summary: A picture is worth a thousand words?What about video tapes?Toni Stark is not broken, but she is down. She does need people and she has them.Stane, Vanko, New York, Killian, Sokovia, Johannesburg... she survived them all.This time, Toni won't be the only one to get shot at.Her family and friends will make sure of it.The first part, deals with the presentation.The second, they run the gauntlet.





	1. PROLOGUE

**Author's Note:**

> I went to the movies unbiased as far as the Captain America vs Iron Man went...
> 
> The fact that Tony was a *&¨%$# in the comics was background knowledge...
> 
> With my limited understanding of what happened in the comics, I would be Team Captain America. The Registration Act for me seemed to have very grave long term repercutions like segregation, persectuions a là Nazi vs Jewish and it would only take one more radical anti-superhuman to get this list to know who and where to find them...
> 
> But since MCU is a completely different ball game, I wanted to see what would cause the Civil War... as an author joked, 'Welcome to the Stark Side, we have cookies and all things handsome billionaire' silly but funny and accurate enough.
> 
> I didn't have a preference, a favorite before Civil War... now I do.

May 29, 1985.  
The first cry of a baby filled her ears and she could feel a smile forming in her lips. 11 hours. 11 very tiring hours, but she can finally hold them!

“Maria?” one of the nurses called softly.

Blue eyes fluttered and opened and she was greeted by such a perfect sight that they were soon filled with tears.

Each nurse was holding a tiny buddle, one wrapped in a rose colored blanket and the other in a deep grey one, the nurses extended their arms. More carefully than she ever was with anything, Maria carefully arranged her arms so she could hold both of them, the miniscule beings wriggled a little and let out soft sounds.

Looking down, she saw them, “Welcome to the world, Anastasia Antonia Stark and Arno Edward Stark”.  
.  
.  
.  
1989.

“Where are we going?” the soft voice broke her out of her rage.

Maria glanced back and saw her little Bambina. There was a bandage in her arm that was already red, the cut too deep, she will probably need stitches, many tiny cuts in her face and hands. She had to look away before the rage took over again.

“We are going on a trip, Bambina, until I talk to your father about some things” but Maria should know that her little one was too smart for this.

“You are mad at father, aren’t you?”

She winced, but didn’t answer at first, Maria may not be a genius like her daughter, but she knew her child and knew where her mind was, “None of this is your fault. This entire situation is on your father, and your father alone. Do you understand?”

Toni bit her lip and hugged her cherry shaped pillow tighter, wincing when that pulled in the deep cut in her arm. In her eyes her parents wouldn’t be fighting if it wasn’t for her. Father said that she needed to be faster to build smarter, but when she gave him the circuit board, she was scared. The look in her father’s eyes wad dark and very, very scary. Toni didn’t understand yet, but one day she would recognize it for what it was: vicious jealousy that won against the beginnings of pride. 

When she woke up again, her arm was already stitched up and itching a little and they were in their jet, Toni have only been there twice before but she recognized it, she seemed to remember many things.

“Where are we now?”

“The only place you will be safe. If you look out your window, you will see the country of Wakanda”.  
.  
.  
.  
February 15, 2000.

“You DID it!” Maria excited yell was very much unlike her usual pristine and proper behavior, but she couldn’t help it. Her little genius!

“Mom” Toni whispered in protest when she was enveloped in a hug, her blush intensified when she saw Jarvis and Ana videotaping her.

The 14 year old rolled her eyes but endured her family’s effusive affection while reading her early admittance letter to MIT. Toni couldn’t help the smug smile, she knew she would get in, the only obstacle was the living arrangements since…well, she was only 14.

Straight black hair with chocolate brown undertones from her father swung at her waist, her features were clearly inherited from her mother, just as the color of her eyes, icy blue, even if the shape was her father’s. At 14, she was almost 5’7 with lean muscles from her taste in competitive sports, considering their heights, Maria was sure that she would be at least 5’9 like herself by the time she stopped growing. Oh God, Toni didn’t even stop growing and she would already be away from her!

Toni tried not to sound too amused, it was rare that her mother was so flustered that she began to talk in Italian without even realizing it, usually her accent just thickened.

Maria sighed; most parents had 19 years before their children actually entered the adult world, the first step being college, what she was to do with her fragile, young and tiny 14 years old? So precocious, so smart. She tried all year long to convince her Bambina not to apply, getting her high school diploma was too easy and Toni was ready for college, at least intellectually, the one who wasn’t ready was Maria.

Pride and fear made her head spin.

Looking at Toni, she was so young! Ridiculously young and in college! Away from her family! So many horrible things could happen to her while she was still under their roof, what would happen now that she wasn’t?

“Congratulation, Miss” Jarvis and Anna entered the room, the redheaded Hungarian with a plateful of freshly baked white chocolate cookies, she laughed a little when Toni’s eyes lighted up.

“Anna, I love you” she declared before almost shoving the treat down her throat.

“Manners” Maria sighed again before fighting back a grimace for Howard not being there to see her off, too busy for the last five years even for his own company let alone to his daughter and wife, looking for Captain America’s body. Maria couldn’t really argue Toni’s resentment.  
.  
.  
.  
The campus was everything she was promised. Toni Stark finally found herself among people that could actually understand when she went into her ‘techno-babble’ as Aunt Peggy calls it.

In her first day, she put all her notebooks in her Channel backpack, a gift from her mother for her first day.

“I was going to tell you all about brands when you turned 16” Maria sighed and tucked a strand of blonde hair behind her ear, her blue eyes – the identical shade of her daughter’s rolled a little when all Toni did was stare at the backpack in confusion, “Brands, Toni, sometimes they are a good way to spoil yourself. The brand itself little matters for people that can afford to actually buy the factory they are produced” she stopped herself from rolling her eyes again, remembering when Howard literally offered her Prada, “What matters is the tradition behind the brand”

Toni understood a little about brands, that to people with so much venue like her family it was more about the history or, as her mother puts it, the tradition than to show off, but as a future engineer, the young heiress was already thinking about cost and benefit, about the quality of a product over the price.

Thanks to her memory that was diagnosed and classified as photographic, not that her mother told her father or else it would already be in all newspapers and magazines the world had to offer, she didn’t need the campus map to know where she was going, in her first visit, the dean made sure to show her all the classes, where she was going to live and the important buildings.

The other students looked at her in confusion when she entered the classroom, clearly a lot younger than all of them, Toni could hear the whispers wondering if she was lost or perhaps the daughter of one of the teachers.

Their confusion turned into shock, alarm and intimidation when they learned that she was actually a student which turned into vicious jealousy when Toni frequently corrected the teachers, the books and turned her tests barely half an hour after they started.

After a year of college, Toni followed the MO from her entire academic life. She has always been five to six years younger than everybody else in her class and that was not taken kindly by the rest of her…school peers. She tried making friends, but when you are a six year old surrounded by 11 years old… social science was still a science, so Toni researched and what she found was disheartening.

For young children, a single year was a huge amount of time, you don’t even see a 4 year old hanging around a 5 year old in the park, just like the older counterparts, they tend to orbit those similar to them, in appearance if nothing less. So Toni had no hope nor expectation of making friends by the time she got into college, since she was 4 and build her first circuit board, she knew that ‘friends’ wasn’t exactly something that she would easily acquire until her twenties, long after her academic life was over.

So, Toni was surprised that when one Tiberius Stone got a little too handsy and she was already charging her Taser, she didn’t have to use it. The idiot was tackled to the ground.

The newcomer was tall, broad-shouldered, with a military hair cut African-American and was all muscle. Toni could easily picture him in the football team.

“What the hell is your problem?!” he yelled at Stone’s drunk face.

Toni could think whatever she wanted about Stone, but he wasn’t an idiot, he would never risk doing something ‘untoward’ to someone so ‘high profile’ like her, she noticed his state long before she realized his intentions.

“The little slut was asking for it!” he slurred.

And yep, there was a fist flying and footsteps down the corridor.

She reacted quickly, sadly not quickly enough to avoid a scene, but at the nick of time. Toni grabbed the stranger’s arm and dragged him out of the lab and into the open campus, before the many footsteps made it into the labs. He was heaving, his skin was a dark chocolate tone but she still could see the red even in the pale afternoon light. Toni could only imagine what it would be like if he was as pale as she was. 

The guy didn’t seem to notice her herding him towards a Starbucks and making him sit down, but he did notice when she put a latte in front of him while getting a blueberry muffin for herself, only now realizing that she forgot to eat again…since two days ago. He blinked and stared back at her.  
James Rhodes was usually a pretty patient guy. Serious, but hard to actually anger, but seeing that idiot blonde from his Instrumental and Data Acquision classes towering over and touching such a small and obviously young girl made him see red. James never really thought much about Stone besides the fact that the guy oozed money and dickness, out of sight out of mind, but this was step too far, he barely noticed the girl sitting him somewhere until there was a latte in front of him. Uh.

Glancing up, James was met by curious icy blue eyes. Not the gazes of a few girls whose attention he got, more like the look his teacher from Thermodynamics got whenever a student asked something actually intelligent.

Blinking again, his eyes widened “Oh my God, I should be the one to buy you something hot to drink, are you ok? Did he hurt you?” but that only seemed to amuse her even more, now that James was actually paying attention, she was dressed in a Black Sabbath shirt and confortable boyfriend jeans with sneakers. Seriously, James would think she was a teacher’s kid, she was… what? 15 tops? It would only blow up even harder in Stone’s face; if not for the very expensive looking backpack and also the ‘Microprocessors in Mechatronics’ 4 inches thick book at the top of many equally big books.

“Well, that was a hell of a first impression” she laughed a little, “I’m Toni Stark, you?”

“James Rhodes” he blinked again, she- Toni looked way too young to be a student… and he heard the name Stark somewhere... that and she didn’t look scared, or even pale, or even bothered by the whole thing.

Toni wrinkled her nose, ‘James’ was so stuffy and formal and she had no qualms about saying as much, “I’m going to call you ‘Rhodey’” she shrugged at his incredulity and bit into her muffin, “You should drink that before it gets cold, unless it’s iced, coffee that was once hot and then gets cold tastes like baby’s formula, unless you like it, in that case, who am I to judge?”

The 20 year old couldn’t help the laugh, and laugh really hard at the absurd girl.  
.  
.  
.  
“YOU ARE 14!?”  
.  
.  
.  
After that Rhodey didn’t leave her alone, might as well, since a semester later, she was already on his classes and causing a ruckus on them when Toni began to once again correct the lectures and the books and the teachers. Was it her fault if they were wrong? A particularly funny incident where the professor called her in front of the class for supposedly cheating on a test because she didn’t show how she got the results, then Toni proceed to correct the entire subject of the semester and connect it with other materials and write down the math in the board. At the end of it, the teacher was red in the face from embarrassment and anger.

“Any other problems with my test, professor?”

Rhodey didn’t know whether to laugh or just stare at her incredulously.  
.  
.  
.  
2002.

“He is not coming” Toni got tired of the beating around the bush her mother, Jarvis and Anna were doing.

“Your father is-”

“Busy, yes I know” she rolled her eyes and adjusted her robes.  
.  
.  
.  
“Ms. Stark?”

“Yes? What is happening?”

“There was an accident. Initial investigations indicate a high level of alcohol…”

“I’m sorry for your loss, Ms. Stark”


	2. The Avengers 2012

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Marvel's Avengers 2012.
> 
> Most conversations belong to Marvel, Joss Wheadon and screewriters.
> 
> The Avengers are the ideal... but the ideal is not always the reality.
> 
> Toni Stark meets Bruce Banner.
> 
> Two genius collide.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Like I said: fastforward. 
> 
> Next chap will probably be up also in a few days, once it gets to Post-Captain America: Civil War it will slow down because that movie gave too much rage and too much info to work on...
> 
> At least the chaps will be a lot bigger in all the senses...

2012  
May, 4  
New York

She loved this part. Encased in what many would call a metal death-trap or not, Toni loved this: the thrusters propelling her off the ground, or in this case off of the water, the hand stabilizers did their jobs in maneuvering her. She headed towards Stark Tower, her newest pride.

“Good to go on this end. The rest is up to you”

“You disconnected the transmission lines so we are off the grid?”

“Stark Tower is about to become a beacon of self-sustained clean energy”

“Well, assuming the Arc Reactor takes over and actually works”

“I assume. Light her up”

Toni’s red lips turned up, the Stark lighting up as well. The tallest building in the horizon, hm, she liked that, mental note to tell Pepper.

“How does it look?”

“Like Christmas, but with more… me”

“You need to do more press and I will be in DC tomorrow to organize the logistics for next three towers…”

“Pepper, Pepper!” Toni admonished lightly, “Slow down, enjoy the success”

“… perhaps for the next five minutes” she joked back.

“Ma’am, Agent Coulson of SHIELD is on the line”

She rolled her eyes, “Why do we even bother to put a schedule on the contract when he just rolls in whenever he wants anyway?”

“Ma’am?”

“I’m not in, Jay, he knows the rules. Agent Agent can wait”

“Levels are holding steady… I think” Toni smiled at that as the last boot of the Iron Woman suit was tucked away. Pepper had the same cunning for business that she had, the difference between them and what makes Potts better than her, at least long term, was that she actually liked it.

Toni’s love was in the building things and Pepper loved bossing people around. The decision of making her CEO of Stark Industries two years ago was the best she ever did for the company, Palladium poisoning or not, Toni would have handed the reins to someone else if there was anyone else that she trusted and was as competent as Pepper, since such a combination didn’t exist…

That all being said, Pepper wasn’t the most technologically savvy person Toni ever met, the billionaire still laughed a little when Pepper moved, at least for the time being, her primary residence here to New York and she called Toni at 3 am desperate because she couldn’t figure out the cables to the newest Stark TV and American Idol was on.

“Of course they are, I build it”

Pepper huffed a little but still handed her a glass of champagne.

“To a clean world”

“To a world with clean energy” the redhead corrected but she was smiling.

“But aren’t you the one always talking about publicity?”

Pepper was already opening her mouth, “Ma’am, I’m afraid that my protocols are being overridden… the phone”

“Stark, we need to talk”

Toni sighed at that and reached for her phone, “You have reached thee life model decoy of Toni Stark, please leave a message” Pepper smiled at that.

“This is urgent”

“Then leave it urgently” but she barely got the last word when the elevator pinged open, the billionaire huffed, “Security breach”

“Ms. Stark?”

“Phil, come in”

“I can’t stay”

“ ‘Phil’”? Toni stared incredulously at Pepper that was already getting up to greet the agent, “His first name is ‘Agent’”.

“We are celebrating” Pepper smiled to the shorter man.

“Well, we were” Toni stared at the computer in Phil’s arm. The SHIELD logo was already making her crave Advil.  
.  
.  
.  
“Phil is pretty shaken”

“How would you know he’s… why is he ‘Phil’?” Toni made her damnest not to smile, she valued her life and death by Jimmy Choo shoes is so… unheroic…  
.  
.  
.  
‘Shoot to Thrill’ blasted from the speakers and made all SHIELD agents look at each other in confusion. What the…

“Why, hello, Ms. Rushman…long time no see” Natasha had to smile a little at the sheer nerve of the woman.

Iron Woman blasted Loki away and aimed all visible weapons, “Your turn, Rudolph” and when he raised his hands and shed his armor, she also lowered hers, “Good choice”

“Ms. Stark”

Toni raised an eyebrow, not that anyone would see, and looked at the corner of her eyes at the tired and injured man, even if he was already healing at an astonishing rate, she almost huffed, “Captain”  
.  
.  
.  
“I don’t like it”

“what? Rock of Ages giving up so easily?”

“I don’t remember being that easy, this guy packs a wallop”

Toni also felt a little suspicious but for now she was willing not to look at the horse’s mouth, “Well, you’re pretty spry for an older guy”.  
.  
.  
.  
“Power at 475% capacity”

She could feel her eyebrow raising and a smirk on her lips, “Don’t tell me…”  
.  
.  
.  
“He really grows on you, doesn’t he?” and unknown still muffled voice down the corridor, quiet and amused, while Toni was still trying to annoy Agent Agent into spilling the beans about what was going on between him and Pepper.

“Loki is gonna drag this out. So… Thor, what’s his play?” and yep, Captain was in full Captain mode.

“He has an army” on the other hand, Thor, and here Toni had to snort a little, she really wasn’t buying the whole ‘God of Thunder’ thingy, “called the Chitauri, they are not of Asgard nor any known world”. Oh, Dear now ‘Asgard too’, her very much scientific mind is kinda a horns nest now, “He means to lead them against your people. They will win him the Earth, in return, I suspect, for the Tesseract” glowy cube right. And boy those hallways really echo, she was walking with Coulson for quite few steps now and they still didn’t reach the… ship’s bow?

“An army? From outer space?”

“So he is building another portal, that’s why he needs Eric Selvig for”

“Selvig?”

“He is an astrophysicist” Toni has to smile at that, of this ragtag team there only a few people who are both: not paper pushers, nor trigger-happy and would actually connect the portal that collapsed the SHIELD building and Loki’s interest in Eric Selvig and actually say ‘astrophysicist’ so naturally, she had to admit that meeting a guy that would actually be able to keep with her academically, especially since he wasn’t old enough to be at least her father, would be a completely novel experience and thanking a God she doesn’t believe in for it not being Reed Richards.

“He is a friend” at that she had to pause her favorite activity, ‘Pestering Agent Agent’. Eric Selvig knew Thor? She really need to hack SHIELD ASAP.

“Loki has him under some kind of spell, along with one of ours”. And she had to pause again, ok the vulnerability in Natalie/Natasha’s voice wasn’t matching with the picture of the cold, rude, distrustful assassin Toni had in her head.

“I want to know why Loki let us take him. He is not leading an army from here”

“I don’t think we should be focusing on Loki, that guy’s brain is a bag full of cats, you can smell crazy on him” she huffed a laugh.

“Have care how you speak. Loki is beyond reason but is of Asgard and he is my brother” yeah, that she read in the files, crazy guy that sent a crazy… armor? Robot? And destroyed a city in Mexico.

“He killed 80 people in two days”

“He is adopted” if the situation was different, Toni would already be rolling on the ground laughing. Oh god, watching this group talk would already be like the greatest sitcom ever.

“I think it’s about the mechanics” and finally she could see them, those metal hallways really echo, “Iridium, what do they need the iridium for?” and that where she steps in.

“It’s a stabilizing agent” she raised her voice, her heels clicking in the, guess what? Also metal floors, lowering it again, she insisted one more time, “I’m just saying, keep love alive, you both travel a lot…it could actually be pretty ideal, if it is not already” and here insert a pointed look where she makes a show of searching his face.

“Yes, yes, Ms. Stark but you probably should join the others” Phil’s voice was a lot lower and didn’t lose any of its clarity, the hell he does that?

“Means that the portal won’t collapse on itself like it did at SHIELD. You got one mean left hook” Toni smiled at the blonde mountain of muscles that towered her by quite a bit even with her 6’1 feet with her heels. Wow, she dated a few jocks but this one would make them all look like pubescent boys. 

Thor was looking at her in confusion, “You are the armored one”

“You got it” and then he smiled, and dear lord, he actually looked like a god… even if she still wasn’t swallowing that he was one.

“I must mention you to Lady Sif, she will be overjoyed to know that a fair maiden such as yourself joins men in the field of battle when so many others prefer more quaint ways”

And ok, Toni smiled hugely for many reasons at that moment and no one could fault her.

Since she was directly on her line of vision, she saw Natasha’s shoulders tensing in what Toni thought was insult, the next one was Rogers chocking in his own spit, Maria Hill the image of the professional wall gawked, just for a gleeful second before she remembered herself, but one second is enough for Toni’s photographic memory, Phil actually twitching in shock and Bruce Banner’s blushing madly, that one was so cute, that now she had to hack SHIELD and get the security footage…and also because she was genuinely amused and a little flattered with Thor and decided to play along, for once not because she was mocking, it would feel like kicking a Golden Retriever puppy.

“Well, I assume Lady Sif is a skilled warrior herself and that she also has many tales full of glory” she had to suppress a laugh when Thor beamed at her and everyone had the same reaction of a few seconds ago, Toni would love to continue this, but she had work to do, “Back to the topic: the stability provided by the iridium will prevent the collapse and it also provides Loki with a portal as wide as he wants for as long as he wants”. She turned to the center control and had to laugh at the setup, Toni couldn’t help herself.

“Uh… raise the mizzenmast. Jib the topsails” by then all the agents were looking at her, except one… “That man is playing Galaga! He thought we wouldn’t notice, but we did” after this she would have a good laugh at Steve reaction, even if uncertain whether it is because he doesn’t know what Galaga is or something else.

Toni manipulated the screens and when they didn’t have the same mobility of hers, she had to mock them, “How does Fury see the ones in the left?”

“He turns” Maria Hill, she heard of her.

“That already made me tired. The rest of the raw materials, Agent Barton can easily acquire, the only major one that you can’t find just anywhere is a power source of high-density” she nosed around the files and implanted her device, JARVIS would come online in a few minutes, “something to kick-start the cube”

“When did you become an expert in thermonuclear astrophysics?” Hill’s tone was mild, but her face was disapproving and had just a hint of disdain.

“Last night” and Toni rejoiced when she was taken back at her casual answer, “Selvig’s note on the extraction theory papers?” she tried when everybody in the room looked confused or didn’t answer aside from Bruce that was busy with a thinking face staring at his glasses, “Dear lord, it feels like school again and once again I’m the only one that did the homework” she muttered.

“Does Loki need any particular kind of power source?” at that Bruce glanced up.

“He’d have to heat the cube to 120 million kelvin just to break through the Coulomb barrier” and that what she was talking about, Bruce Banner probably didn’t even need to read Selvig’s notes, then again thermonuclear astrophysics wasn’t her area at all, still…

“Unless, Selvig has figured out how to stabilize the quantum tunneling affect”

He blinked and then shrugged but something in Bruce’s face changed with the challenge Toni represented, oh this was going to be interesting, “Well, if he could do that, he could achieve heavy ion fusion in any reactor on the planet”

She smiled, “Would you look at that? Someone who speaks English”

“Is that what just happened?”

Both ignored the Captain, “It’s good to meet you, Dr. Banner. I read many of your papers, your work in antielectron collision is unparalleled…and I’m also a huge fan when you lose control and turn into an enormous, green, rage monster”.

He blinked as though not knowing what to say; yep she often had this effect on people.  
.  
.  
.

“Are you really that naïve? SHIELD monitors potential threats”

“Is Captain America being watched?”

“We all are”  
.  
.  
.  
“Stark I swear to God, you say one more word…”

“Oh! Threat, verbal threat, I feel threatened!”  
.  
.  
.  
“Big girl in a metal suit, take that away and what are you?”

“I’m still the fucking genius that designed and built it in the first place. Take away the serum and what are you?”  
.  
.  
.  
“Put on the suit, let’s go a few rounds”  
.  
.  
.  
They said their goodbyes and both Toni Stark and Steve Rogers left thinking that perhaps the other wasn’t so bad. Turning to look at her passenger seat, Toni turned her attention back to how she was going to convince this scientific Teddy Bear to stay, because damn if she was going to let him go anytime soon.


	3. Iron Wo(Man) 3 2013

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> New and Old...
> 
> Bruce Banner;
> 
> Maria Hill;
> 
> Harley Keener;
> 
> Royce Keener;
> 
> Maya Hansen.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this is the result of insomnia...

2013.  
Rose Hill, Tennessee.

So perhaps she was, sometimes, it is important to emphasize that, an idiot.

As she dragged the Iron Woman armor to the nearest town, Toni cursed herself for the umpteenth time. So much for cleaning her act! She was still one impulsive, emotional wreck. The only good thing about this whole joke is that Bruce was still in New York when Pepper and her went back to Malibu for the expansion plans to open the Stark Solutions division, but that still left Pepper in harm’s way and that is…beyond unacceptable and that was not talking about Maya Hansen that was also blasted away and suffered who knows how many injuries.

She snorted to herself, almost twenty eight fucking years old and she still behaved like someone in their teens. Bruce and Pepper were right about that much.  
.  
.  
.  
“So, who’s home?”

“Hm, my dad already left for the diner and my mom went to the 7-11 to get some scratchers, I guess she won ‘cause that was six years ago”.  
.  
.  
.  
“Discourages bullying. Non-lethal, just to cover one’s ass” she liked this kid, he was a cute little thing, didn’t even reach her collarbones and he was smart and just like her, since he is actually reaching for the flash bomb, too smart for his own good, “Deal?”

“Deal”

“What it’s you name?”

“Harley. And you’re…”

“The mechanic. You can call me Toni” she looked at him just as her stomach reminded her, “You know what keeps going through my head? Where is my tuna sandwich?”  
.  
.  
.  
“You know what this crater reminds me of?”

“No idea and no care”

“That giant wormhole in, um, in New York, doesn’t remind you?” he stared excitedly at her, oblivious 10 year old.

“That’s manipulative, I don’t wanna talk about it”

“Are they coming back, the aliens?”

“Maybe, can you stop?” Toni got out the words before she could get out of breath, shit, that was too harsh again wasn’t it? “Remember what I told that I have anxiety issue?”

“Does this subject make you edgy?” and yep there goes her oxygen.

“A little bit” she took many deep breaths through her mouth.

“Are there bad guys in Rose Hill? Do you need a plastic bag to breath in? do you have medication?”

Oh god, so many words! Note to self to apologize to every single person she ever blabbed nonsense to… actually to every person she ever babbled nonsense to and she actually likes, that should reduce the list to Pepper, Bruce, Happy and Rhodey…ok and Agent Agent.

“No”

“Do you need to be on it?”

“Probably” and Toni wanted to kick herself, that wasn’t something she admitted to even Pepper.  
“Do you have PTSD?”

“I have no idea” oh, if Pepper only knew that being on the edge of an anxiety attack was all that takes to make her answer shit like this honestly.

“Are you going completely mental?” she stared at him in incredulity, oh so that’s how it feels. Amazing how her head could still twirl and think like that with her eyesight blurring and this never ending desire to crack her own chest open so it would stop constricting her goddam lungs!  
.  
.  
.  
“Oh my god, what am I gonna do?” she almost kicked the car’s door open and sat on the street.

“Ok breath, just breath ok?” Harley tried to find the right words, “You’ re a mechanic right? You said so”

“Yeah” yes, that is a true, a true she can hang on.

“The why don’t you just build something?”

Ever so slowly her breath evened out and her head stopped spinning, her chest wasn’t burning anymore, she has never been good with kids and more often than not has no idea how to deal with them, sometimes she comes off as a little too harsh and sometimes she gets it just right, not unlike every other relationship with any of the adults in her life, so perhaps she wasn’t very, personally, good with people at all. She can twist and turn with the media like they were her little dolls, but personal relationships? Friends, lovers, the little family she has left, Toni either royally screws it up or gets it so perfectly no one can deny she isn’t thoughtful and caring. She sighed, Rhodey was right, there was no middle ground for her was there?  
She wished she knew how to say more, but Toni would probably screw it up if she tried, “Ok. Thanks, kid”  
.  
.  
.  
“So that is what this was all about? A show?”

“Well for someone who loves the spotlight as much as you do…” Aldrich Killian trailed off while injecting the Extremis into her blood stream, Toni watched as that orange and red thing travelled through the tube and into her arm and there was fire in her veins.  
.  
.  
.  
“Hey” Bruce startled at the voice and took Toni’s hand.

“Hey” he tightened the grip.

“So? How it went?”

“We managed to stabilize Extremis in both you and Dr. Hansen but yours were more advanced than the one Hansen injected in herself, we are still working out all the details, but at least you won’t go critical. The Arc Reactor is intact, actually one good thing came out of this mess, it seems that because Extremis access the area of the brain that governs repair and chemically recode it, for all intents and purposes, your body biochemistry now includes the Arc Reactor, the device biologically makes part of your body now”

“Well… controversial thoughts about that” the physicist agreed with a nod, “Thanks for rushing in” Bruce had to gape a little at that and he was suddenly fighting for control against the ‘Other Guy’.

“I ‘rushed in’ when I turned on the TV and saw your house going down the ocean, Toni what the hell? You- I- how can anyone be so…” he stopped himself at her laugher.

“You’re cute when you flustered” how many times Bruce gaped at her or blushed at something she said or did? Or both at the same time like now?  
.  
.  
.  
“Called it” Rhodey bragged to Pepper and Happy when they saw Bruce Banner and Toni Stark kissing under the mistletoe. Because Bruce was only 5’8 and Toni was already taller than him at 5’9 she was barefoot, actually everybody was barefoot.

If Rhodey didn’t know any better he’d say that it was just a coincidence, but Toni could be pretty sneaky when she wanted to.

They were celebrating a late Christmas in Toni’s Malibu penthouse since her mansion was destroyed and Pepper insisted on relocating instead of just building another one in the same space now that the world knew her address, so Toni sold it and bought another land also in the coast, the construction would only begin in February, but at least the paperwork was done.

In the middle of a simple, by Toni’s standards, celebration, the only ones there were Rhodey, Pepper, Happy, Bruce, Maya, Phil and Maria Hill, the last three being dragged and manipulated into coming as in Toni babbled so fast and so much gibberish that they agreed without knowing what they agreed to just shut her up. Toni would have invited the Avengers, but after New York she didn’t even know where Clint and Natasha are, probably in a SHIELD mission, Thor was in Asgard, Rogers relocated to DC for reasons she still didn’t understand, perhaps SHIELD issued? But she wasn’t interested enough to pester Maria or Phil about that and Bruce lived with her, or at least in one of her houses since New York.

And wasn’t that funny? After what the public is now calling ‘The Battle of New York’, Toni and Maria actually began to get along, as in she was as amusingly exasperated as Phil when dealing with Toni Stark but you could still call them friends.

So when everybody noticed the impromptus making out, Maria cracked a smile and a joke about ‘Science Couple’. Toni didn’t mind, she didn’t even mind the cliché of the mistletoe, Bruce was a cliché kind of guy and honestly? Coming from him, she kinda liked it. Oh god, this time next year she will be dreaming of white picket fences.  
.  
.  
.  
Toni made sure to call Harley and thank him again and also to his dad that had no idea what to feel about her reforming their garage…and also his little six year old sister, Royce, and thank her for the watch. Those were interesting conversations.


	4. Thor the Dark World and Captain America the Winter Soldier

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Because Toni and Bruce are smart little cookies... and also not the only ones...
> 
> Steve begins to show that he doesn't give much thought to other repercussions of his decisions beyond what he is trying to accomplish.
> 
> Peter Parker enter the scene and Toni is forced to make a decision.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I just want to emphasize that the list is not necessarily true or even my opinion, I only researched the basics and the consensus. And I also wrote 'intelligence and scientific contributions' so it's not RAW inteligence rank. 
> 
>  
> 
> I also put Helen Cho in Amadeus' place because he is 616's Helen's SON, and the woman is not even 30 yet, to have a teenager son? I don't see her doing that, nothing against those who do, but to accomplish everything she did in her career at her age, a child occupies a lot of your time, especially in the first years, so...
> 
> This is where it begins to deviate from canon MCU, nothing that will change the big schemes, but it IS a big change.

2014

New York.

Stark Tower.

 

“Toni? **_Toni!_** ” Bruce was shaking her.

 

“Uh, what?” she opened an eye to see that he was already showered and changed, god, yesterday they went to bed at the same time for once how is he not tired?

 

“You have to see this!” he insisted and then huffed when he saw that his girlfriend fell asleep again, instead of shaking her since it would yield the same results, Bruce took the StarkPad and transferred the files Phil sent them to the TV in front of the bed.

 

Bruce actually woke up half an hour ago because he needed to head to Stark Solutions and oversee the newest results of the experiments with Extremis that he was doing with Maya when JARVIS told him to check his email and that Phil Coulson sent them something that was urgent. What he saw, he barely believed and now here he was, trying to wake his girlfriend up.

 

It’s not like he doesn’t understand why she is so tired. While normally he works just as hard and for just as long as her, his heavier work load actually began a couple of weeks ago. Pepper Potts and Toni already gave numerous press conferences where they emphasized that Stark Industries would not work in biochemistry, they were always a tech company and they will keep being a tech company. Stark Solutions would work independently of Stark Industries, and although they could and would collaborate in their projects, one existed apart from the other, a whole other board of directors, chief officers and focus. Stark Solutions would focus on the biological, chemicals, genetically leaning parts of science development.

 

With the construction of the next three Stark Towers in Tokyo, German and Italy where she actually had a lot of influence considering her tech work and heritage, the last one her own mother drilled into her that her origin culture was important to learn, Toni was also talking with Pepper to open another division under the Stark name, perhaps Stark International.

 

So Toni and Pepper were completely wiped with all the bureaucracy, logistics, and paperwork of the projects. Stark Solutions inaugurated a month ago and came to full functionality exactly three weeks ago. Bruce was proud of his work and his scientific knowledge and had dozens of papers under his name from before the Hulk so when Pepper offered to make him head of R&D of Stark Solutions, he agreed, knowing full well that neither Toni or Pepper would offer if he wasn’t actually qualified and not just because he was, pardon the French, ‘banging the boss’. They were all for helping those dear to them, but professionally the two businesswomen were infinitely more reserved.

 

He was working closely with Maya Hansen, in probation of SHIELD that promised to give her a clean slate if she stayed the next two years out of trouble and a new face: Dr. Helen Cho, actually Bruce heard of her before. She may have done the 19 years of school and full college term, but her papers in biogenetics were so advanced that even made Toni and Bruce pause, Helen just needed the funds and the time to expand her research… not to mentioning the engineer to build what she is calling ‘The Cradle’.

 

They tried to get Stephen Strange, a beyond brilliant neurosurgeon to be a consultant but it seems it wasn’t good enough for him because Stark Solutions was still too novice in the biological fields. Wow. All of Toni’s ego and none of her charm, Bruce can’t say that the experience endeared him to any of the current employees.

 

So yeah, for the time being and the foreseeable future Toni was completely exhausted, Pepper too, but Bruce didn’t live with Pepper, “Toni, look at this!” he insisted and although usually he would feel like a bastard for keeping her awake since most of the time he was attempting to do the opposite, this was actually urgent. He raised the sound.

 

“The governmental body known as SHIELD just issued an arrest warrant for one Steven Grant Rogers aka Captain America, security footage shows him escaping SHIELD main headquarters and destroying one of their Quinjets, details of the…”

 

“WHAT?!” now Toni was awake, the last time Bruce had to do this was when Thor was popping up all over the world and fighting… another kind of aliens? Just a few weeks ago and now this.

.

.

.

“What the hell is going on?” she muttered horrified. First Steve is a fugitive, then a public firefight in the middle of DC and while Bruce and her were running around trying to find out what the hell is happening and trying to cover as many holes as Captain America and Black Widow were blowing up now this.

 

Three ships from something called Project Insight but Toni didn’t even have the time to look at what in the world that even was when JARVIS alerted them about the SHIELD files, ALL of them being dumped in the internet.

 

What. The. Hell?

 

They were horrified, all their personal files online for the world to see. All the personal and professional information of every single SHIELD agent exposed to the public and everyone that they were ever involved with, alias, identities, projects, finances, intelligence. Fucking **_ongoing_** missions! Every single senior member of Stark Industries and Stark Solutions working on unfucking this shitstorm; what the hell? But by then it was too late, the 21 st century was a digital book, messages and information traveled by the seconds. The most they could do was damage control.

 

“If I don’t get good news in the next five minutes there will be a ‘Code Green” Bruce almost snarled to his colleagues and interns which made them run around desperately faster.

 

SHIELD was well aware of Thaddeus Ross persecution of the Hulk, back in 2008 they even sent Toni to distract him to get just enough time take him off of Bruce’s trail, and while that was all good and great and he was even amused when Toni bought his favorite bar when Ross tried to kick her out, they also had access to the videos of the experiments, the tortures. Not only of his time in the army’s hands but also of Toni’s in Ten Rings and **_that_** he would not forgive.

.

.

.

Toni and Bruce sighed tiredly again. Yes, they could understand why Steve dumped the files…but it was still incredibly stupid of him, irresponsible and reckless. Basically everything he always accuses Toni of being when they fight.

 

It would take years of work to try and fine comb the files and they decided to prioritize: first rescue and extract the agents in ongoing missions, seriously was Steve this crazy? What about the undercover agents? He probably killed who knows how many agents with just this. Then they would slowly work on the intelligence that SHIELD accumulated over the years, it’s not like they didn’t care that all this dangerous information is up for the world to see, but they still had their own work to do and there weren’t many people capable of doing what they did.

 

Bruce still rolled his eyes a little at that 8’s 250 list that came out a few months ago. Basically the 8 people with IQ close or surpassing 250 points, the eight people whose IQ is so high that no test in the planet can accurately measure them and they were ranked by scientific contributions and intelligence:

 

1-Reed Richards;

2-Hank Pym;

3-Bruce Banner;

4-Toni Stark;

5-T’Challa;

6-Hank McCoy.

7-Helen Cho;

8-Charles Xavier.

 

While no one in the scientific community contests its **_members_** , it was a little hard not to contest the positions. Toni was indignant but Bruce managed to stop her before she made a scene, a very public scene, not that he didn’t enjoy it when her snarky, furious focus was in someone else, but making enemies with the people on that list wasn’t on Bruce’s **_bucket_** list.

 

He still felt amusement with Victor von Doom’s immediate reaction, of course his little revenge destroyed quite a big part of the main streets in New York, primary residence of the many members of that thing, but his face was still funny. Bruce could also understand why that very American-made list, aside from King T’Challa and Charles Xavier would want to exclude the tyrant ruler of Latveria that was charged almost everywhere else from crimes against humanity to murder and extortion.

 

Bruce wouldn’t say it even under torture, and he would know, but something told him that if Doom **_was_** on that list, Charles Xavier wouldn’t be…also old enough to have respect just because of that or not, Bruce was a little sore for being ranked **_after_** Hank Pym, the man hadn’t had a single breakthrough since his wife was still alive, and while that was horrible to even think, it was also true. He was pretty sure that Toni felt the same and while Toni didn’t like Richards she was willing to be ranked lower than him and Bruce was her boyfriend so she was biased, but Hank Pym? The guy that wouldn’t even **_touch_** anything with the name Stark on it because of **_Howard_**? Really?

 

She sighed, Toni knew that everybody on that list was also working tirelessly on the SHIELD files, and yes in her head she was forced to admit that Doom should be on it, which means that he was also probably taking advantage of Rogers’ idiocy. Whatever their personal flaws are, they wouldn’t just hand that much info on a silver plate and let it up to grabs, so it was 8 against 1. Underappreciated genius is practically one of the biggest clichés in history, so she also knew that other little geniuses in the world good or bad naturedly were also nosing around. Toni massaged her temples.

 

Duping all SHIELD files destroyed the presence of HYDRA infiltrated on SHIELD yes, but it also gave HYDRA exactly what they wanted: SHIELD intelligence, of course it wasn’t only that, but he basically paraded around all HYDRA could possibly want on the short term: weapons design, the Helicarriers codes, safe houses, families, friends, associates, what they already accomplished and what they were hoping to accomplish, the list was almost endless. The only thing Steve actually did was stopping HYDRA from using SHIELD anymore, because the rest was not only on HYDRA’s but the world’s eyes.

 

“Ma’am?”

 

“Yes, JARVIS?”

 

“I’m afraid I have more bad news” he sounded a little chocked and Toni immediately stopped, oh hell, what now?

 

“Please don’t tell me Rogers decided to dump all of Pentagon’s files too”

 

“It’s about Mrs. Sousa’s grandson” she sucked a sharp breath.

.

.

.

The 15 year old was crying silently, no sobs, no shaking shoulders, the grief of someone much older. Hazel eyes and brown hair. The hazel eyes he inherited from his mother, but the brown hair was a common trait in both father and mother’s families. And in hers, Toni supposed.

 

The genius herself missed them and it pained her to know that the small and fragile baby she carried around when she was barely a teenager was now a young man that suffered so much and, in his eyes, was alone in the world. Due to her high profile life, Toni tried to put some distance between them, their lifestyle were literally opposites, depended on opposites, while Toni worked her magic under the spotlights, it actually prevented shadows from reaching her, they needed shadows to survive their line of work. So when Mary joined CIA, Toni knew she was losing her best friend and a woman that, in so many ways, was a sister to her.

 

Mary married a bio-geneticist, Richard Parker, that constantly worked for the government. When they had Peter, Toni knew that she would never be able to actually be in his life. Toni Stark visiting some random house? That would go over well, back then she didn’t know how to blend in, nowadays the only reasons she manages is because no one expects Toni Stark to wear band t-shirts a size too big and boyfriend jeans with converses, too used to seeing her in gala dresses or in suits that almost oozed professionalism and power…literally in the Iron Woman armor’s case.

 

And there they were, almost 14 years later and she needed to make a decision, a life changing decision in the next 5 minutes if the police officer approaching Peter was anything to go by. She was in a nondescript car; the only Happy drives her around and just looking in the police station where the teenager was waiting in the benches.

 

When Mary asked her to be his godmother and Richard agreed, Toni didn’t think that she would ever need to exert that right. Yes their line of work is beyond dangerous, but they were good at what they did and they had the kind of backup that no CIA agent could ever dream of having and Richard’s job was in a desk and in a lab for heaven’s sake. When Mary and Richard died in that plane and left a 4 year old behind, Toni knew that Ben and May Parker would step in.

 

The couple was young, healthy and although they didn’t have very good jobs, it was enough to raise young Peter, and they did with all the love as if he was their own. When Ben died, Toni worried; May didn’t have the kind of income that would last with two people now depending on it without making some serious cutting, she didn’t have any illusions that May didn’t know where the small, for Toni, checks were coming from, a little more than what Ben made but Toni breathed a sigh of relief when she saw that May kept their apartment and their lifestyles.

 

And now…who was left? Richard was an only child, and his parents were already too old to walk on their own, let alone take care of an adolescent.

 

Mary had a brother, worked for the government overseas so often that Toni only knew him in passing and with the little Mary and Aunt Peggy told her of him, Toni knew he valued his career a little too much. Stepping down and giving up the job he sacrificed so much for to take care of the teenage son of the sister he barely talked to? There were the other Carters. Toni knew that Sharon and her father were still active in SHIELD, she knew that now that Black Widow and Captain America sunk it, Sharon followed the rest of the family’s footsteps: CIA. She snorted, for the older generation Carters and Sousas it was either CIA or SHIELD or some other governmental job that involved guns and fists, Sharon was still so shortsighted.

 

Toni looked down, Sharon just turned 27 she was a single year younger than Toni herself but she already got involved with the CIA, her father went under with the rest of the SHIELD agents that weren’t compromised, Toni had no doubt that Fury would keep a couple of dozens close to him so he could do as he ever did even more under wraps now that the world thinks SHIELD is no more.

 

She sighed again and cracked her neck.

 

Toni knew that this was the most likely scenario: people dying because now the enemies, the criminals, the terrorist that SHIELD put away or undermined knew who their enemies were, she bit her lip. She didn’t want to be mad at Rogers, but right is getting really hard, he dumped a ton of workload on her lap and hurt so many people and he probably doesn’t even realizes it.

 

Mary and Richard Parker were people of interest to SHIELD, the daughter of one of SHIELD’s founders that became a CIA agent? Richard was also a controversial scientist, Cross-Species genetics weren’t exactly a field very talked about, if only because even the name sounds nuts but he actually got somewhere. There was also information about them in SHIELD’s database, it was like Natasha said: SHIELD monitors potential threats and everyone, anyone more talented was a potential threat.

 

Quickly coming to a decision, Toni opened the door.


End file.
